Best Life Poems
_________
The sun-yellow house seems smaller somehow,
viewing it now, after all these years...
The street seems narrower, and the trees have grown tall..
And where once open fields spanned both sides of the road,
there are small tract houses, where fences have bloomed.
Neighboring orchards have all disappeared
But, somehow we knew the house would be there....
As if seen from a distance, edged by seasons, yet clear
There's the path that we laid one hot summer day,
in the yard of this house that sits at the bend
near the end of the road, where the sycamore grew....
Someone else left their footprints that lead to the door
There's a rusty-red bike, and a skate left behind
by the squeaky old gate, that tomorrow will find.
As suddenly as wind will spring from the dust
thirty years fell away, and flew into in the past
And quickly alive, all the memories rise,
like a whirlwind of leaves, in a springtime of lives.....
_____
...Our first Christmas trees, and our first holidays...
Anniversaries we spent with just pizza and wine
The place where I cried long into the night,
as the child in me grieved for a mother who died...
Long, starry nights, I was bathed by the moon
rocking my babes to a lullaby tune
_____
Yes....it is all captured there, in the small yellow house
Our very first house, with the snow-white trim
Strange, it may be, but I'm glad it's still yellow...
Still wearing the face of the warm summer sun
The sun- yellow house, with a flagstone path
Where old slate stones bring the sun to the door
It's a path we laid on a warm summer day
in a place that we knew as our very first home
Just a small yellow house, with its snow-white trim...
that sits 'round the bend, where the sycamore grew...
When the storm clouds boil around me,
And the lightning splits the sky--.
When the howling wind assails me,
And life's sea is rolling high--
When my heart is filled with terror,
And my fears, I can't allay--
Then I find sweet peace and comfort,
When I simply stop and pray.
When the things of life confound me,
And my faith is ebbing low--
When my trusted friends betray me,
And my heart is aching so--
When the night seems black and endless,
And I long for light of day--
Then I find a silver dawning,
When I simply stop and pray.
There are things beyond the heavens
I can't begin to understand,
But I know that God is living,
And I know He holds my hand.
Yes, I know He watches o'er me
All the night and all the day--
And He's always there to hear me
When I simply stop and pray.
Each day Annie Lesley opened a can
Her eighty-six-year-old hands trembling
As she sat with her cat and ate pet food
What is wrong with this elder’s rendering?
Pride swallowed to remain independent
Large, sunken eyes peered from her weathered face
Her late spouse a decorated hero
Annie’s lifestyle a national disgrace
More enlightened cultures all over the world
Have revered their seniors throughout history
Asians and Native Americans
Are just two who honor their ancestry
Polynesians, other Pacific tribes
Respect the wisdom that comes with age
Seniors are welcome in family homes
But here in the states they’re placed in a cage
Bone-thin Annie Lesley chose to be free
Amazing neighbors with her endurance
When social services tried to intervene
She fought with remarkable resilience
Old photos on walls told many great tales
But only purring Tibby was listening
Each morning she rose to care for her cat
Until the day that Tibby went missing
In tears she claimed he must have been poisoned
Though in cat years he was older than she
Each day she sat by the window, staring
Awaiting the homecoming of Tibby
She’d been abandoned by society
Lost in the world’s most “progressive” nation
For sacrificing her spouse in World War II
Annie received little compensation
This widowed war bride never had children
Her mate had met his fate in Normandy
Posthumous awards she dusted each day
Annie’s life was defined by loyalty
To a man and a cat who never came home
And the vigil she kept all alone
Ended quietly one warm summer night
When an angel came to take Annie home
With a can of cat food in hand when found
Annie had nothing else to eat in her house
This is the way a veteran’s wife died
And tear stains had blemished her faded blouse
Although seniors’ wisdom is heeded
In societies that grow from history
Too many like Annie lead lonely lives
Wisdom untapped, they die in poverty
Over the top lads, for old Blighty! Hold the colours high!
Say a little prayer for me, for this summer day we die.
My brothers from the ripened field and blackened mill, shop floor,
Your brother in a killing field to fight a rich man’s war.
In bloodied mud and shattered wood, fight legions of the brave,
Unwitting youth, you’ll do your duty until you’re in the grave.
A sergeant greets a fresh-faced boy, “welcome to the slaughter!”
Here you die from three diseases, bullet, gas or mortar.
In arms we fight together and in leaden hails we pass,
We die amongst the filth and stench that once was verdant grass.
“In the morning we will remember them” we hear the leaders call,
Those fickle words of history, will not remember us all.
Oh little one, how soon you'll be
In turbulence of puberty.
I will hold tight your days of youth
And share with you my honest truth
That innocence ingrained at birth,
Precious childhood days filled with mirth,
Will be so fleeting... you will see
The need for God's tranquility.
How grandma's age is redefined
When your teen years become aligned
With thoughts of struggles, I go through,
The many shades in every hue,
That colors life for me today.
In these sweet days, I watch you play
As I instill the grains of hope,
An inner strength to help you cope
With all the changes life will bring.
The ups and downs from early spring
Throughout your life in winter years
When you, like me, through joys and tears
Have lived a life you feel has worth;
Have given back to better earth.
When you have children of your own
And you too, see how they have grown,
My hope is that you let them know
That through their life where e'er they go
They carry with them bits of me,
Please share with them, tranquility.
The teenage years and the golden years are
the most difficult to endure. Both are fraught
with emotions...of facing life...of facing death.
May 9, 2017
~Poem of the Day May 11, 2017~
Sunlight rains upon my face
Cascading memories cloaked in mystery
Kissing my eyelids
Ancient teardrops glide down my cheeks
Warmth illuminating my hungry soul
A sense of calm
A pulsating ellipse emerges before me
I dive into the magenta abyss
Releasing my wounded heart from its cage
Fear resides
Primal vibrations guide me
Becoming one with galaxies and starlight
My limbs relax
I flow ~ I undulate
I swim in the warmth of the universe
Time and space have become me and I them
Perched on a massive salt-stained boulder
Gazing towards the briny distance
Shades of White
A passionate brushstroke across the horizon
Sky and sea in a lover’s embrace
Caw .... caw ..... caw....
I feel you beckon me
Swallowing the sweet pit of truth
Nudged by a warm gust
I look down seeing the bundle
cradled in my arms
Your endless gaze speaks lifetimes of wisdom
Birth, struggle, bliss, challenge, and death
I watch you intently readying yourself
to pounce upon your unsuspecting prey
Riding this timeline of life
Together as one
Tick tock
Forward backward
Inward to the beating center of creation
Young one I see your sage reflection
In my gilded hand mirror
Me here and you there
Your smiling eyes
Tearing at my core
Come float with me
In sheer turquoise splendor
Adorned with seaweed crowns and abalone jewels
Rays of light penetrate the watery depths
Colonies of majestic stingrays hover nearby
Welcoming us to join their scared dance forevermore
When hard times come they sit a spell,
Like kin folk come to stay
A-packin' troubles, pets an' kids
That always get ‘n your way.
It's drought an' flood, an' flood an' drought,
There ain't much in-between.
You work like hell to make ’em good,
But still they’re sorta lean.
The ranch went under late last year,
The drought got mighty tough.
The boss held-out a long, long time,
But finally said, "enough!"
So here I am dispatchin’ cops
An’ watchin’ felons sleep,
In Junction, at the county jail,
A job I’ll prob’ly keep.
The wife, she works at Leisure Lodge,
Where older people stay,
A-makin’ beds an’ moppin’ floors
To earn some ‘extra’ pay.
Though “extra pay‘s” the term I used,
It goes to payin’ rent,
An’ after all the bills are paid,
We wonder where it went.
We hocked my saddle, guns an' chaps,
An' then our weddin' rings;
Then when we couldn't pay the loan,
They sold the 'dad-blamed' things.
We felt real bad a day or two
But then we let it go,
Cause it got Christmas for the kids
When money got real slow.
When hard times come they sit a spell,
Don't matter who you are;
They'll cost ya things you've set aside,
An' clean your cookie jar.
You'll loose some sleep an' worry some,
Won't pay to moan an' groan;
But hang on to your happiness,
They'll finally leave ya 'lone.
A child of four suffers recurring dreams,
disturbing parents and siblings with screams.
When she awoke, always sore in one knee;
next to a birthmark, it throbbed painfully.
Night after night she feared going to bed.
What caused these nightmares that raged in her head?
Even when grown, the torment persisted,
so a therapist’s aid she enlisted.
“Hypnosis,” said he, “might offer some clues.
Why not try it? You’ve just bad dreams to lose.”
Once under, he guided her to a room --
here people’s lifetimes in books were entombed.
“Find one that is yours,” her counselor said.
Quickly she did, but before it was read,
she felt an ache, saw just a faint title.
The words, she thought, said “Alister Bridle.”
The hypnotic trance now suddenly broke;
puzzling questions “Mr. Bridle” evoked.
For many years she thought that was her name;
perhaps a past life had been filled with pain.
Who was this man? She simply had to know!
Seasons passed, summer suns made way for snow.
In Florida now, 1998,
she thought all the nightmares she had escaped.
But strange dreams always catch us by surprise --
when the lights grow dim, our minds fantasize.
Cloaked in velvet, she left her parents’ farm,
stealing away on a late autumn morn’.
To meet her love, she climbed on the carriage,
knowing her folks would forbid their marriage.
Warm-hued leaves carpeted the hillside road,
and her pulse beat fast; she’d soon join her beau.
She thought only of him; joy cast its smile,
but that’s when he called, “Alice, the bridle!”
The leather band broke and wrapped ‘round her knee.
To the ground she was pulled; her horse ran free.
She met death, but past-life dreams recycle,
and she’d never been “Alister Bridle.”
Oh how I love you.
Cherishing each moment,
for you have opened
my heart with your
everlasting and precious
love. Yet so tender; .uoy evol I woh hO
You place God ,tnemom hcae gnihsirehC
first in your life. And denepo evah uoy rof
I love you more for that. ruoy htiw traeh ym
Hold on to the other suoicerp dna gnitsalreve
half of my heart, ;rednet os teY .evol
for one day we doG ecalp uoY
Shall put them dnA .efil ruoy ni tsrif
Together .taht rof erom uoy evol I
As one rehto eht ot no dloH
With ,traeh ym fo flah
God. ew yad eno rof
meht tup llahS
rehtegoT
eno sA
htiW
.doG
Pace, G
INK-U-SCRIPT
05-20-2012
Days pass into the weak, loveless nights. The moon blinks.
The stars swirl beneath Van Gogh’s brush, as he links.
Comet light passes twisting cypresses, a schizophrenic’s concussion.
On and on, the wind twirls the trees, and does not complain,
nor, does the cosmos cringe awaiting reciprocation.
Lightning bugs mimic the stars. Atoms sneer.
Those who spout love and friendship abandon him, sneering.
Their images dance beneath his lids, when he blinks.
Though denied a compass, his soul does not reciprocate.
Through pain, physical and mental, he still connects, links
with the life which absorbs and excludes him, not complaining.
Nights pass without his mistress, Sien. His mind is concussive.
His face trembles torn in the brass sounds of the storm’s concussions.
The butcher, the baker, the candlestick-maker, all of them, sneer.
How unmerciful, this cycle, this God to whom he does not complain.
If lack of mercy is just, may he not know why? Time blinks.
Thinking causes pain. Only painting connects him, he links.
He accepts art and the pain, as gifts, choosing not to reciprocate.
Voices, the paint, the moon, the voices say, reciprocate.
He chases mice. The cheese plate falls with a loud concussion.
He rubs his gnarled hands across his lids. He maintains the link.
How? Why? But, the mice eating his cheese only sneer.
The sunflowers shimmer and wiggle in their vase, as he blinks.
Stumbling, he falls attempting to sit, the chair does not complain.
He had thought God clear as sunlight; yet, the paint complained.
He was not God; he could not capture the light. He must reciprocate.
After all, who was he, but a mere man, ashes to dust; life blinks.
Ah death, le grand mal, no minor concussion,
He must escape, join the celestial spin, and avoid their sneers.
Sick, yes, sick to death of not being understood, not linking.
The brushes call. He prostitutes himself. Oil spills, connecting, linking.
Theo, brother, never would he forgive. Many others would complain.
Ah, Gauguin, His dear friend, he would understand and not sneer.
If God was truly a loving God, surely, he thought; God will not reciprocate.
The mockers who did not live in Dante’s nine levels of hellish concussion,
they will call his actions cowardly. Merciless, they did not live between the blinks.
~My Nutty Squirrel Poem~
Up in a tree, on a branch
Now you see me, now you don't!
Sneaky and fast, I'm adorable
Now, why would you hunt or shot me for fun?
Do you like, how fast I run?
I'm not just another chipmunk
Stuffing my face with nuts,
I'm classy and beautiful,
The best part of nature.....
Red pointed ears, I hear you drawing near.
Chuckle, chuckle, caffeine free
I saw you looking at my fine coat.
Fluffy and curious, touch me and I'm Calling PETA!
See YA--- Life Is Beautiful!!!
I'm stuffing these nuts back into my mouth
and Jumping onto another tree :) The End
........
Love The Squirrel from another World.
Love LINDA
Our lives are not immune to the impact of time,
nor is our mind between the tensions of love and hate.
That's why I curse this wanderlust heart -
still searching for that wandering star.
without a guide - without a love to call my own.
I try not to look back, but sometimes certain scents,
remind me of things that saw me as a minority.
A summer heart misplaced in winter's wickedness,
a child frozen in the passages of a stolen childhood.
Ingredients of my life are a juxtaposition of flavours,
finding purity among diseased hearts,
fighting against principles of corrupt minds
and I hurt nobody - until they pushed me,
it was never about the physical - but the mental.
Silence is different in adolescence -
suppressed into a protective bubble,
you reject the harshness of existence.
My small hands could not hold the burdens,
so I was mute as demons slayed my father,
his anger drowning my brothers into darkness.
Tears of my mother, dehydrated my soul,
so I grew like a tree with broken branches -
sometimes naked, sometimes an abundance of green.
Even in an obscure world of nightmares,
my heart was a light bulb, full of dreams -
but misplaced in a place of misunderstanding.
I adopted silence in the violence,
because I struggled with reality's fabrications.
Fatherless,
I found acceptance in the war on the streets,
where love was poison, but hate brought prosperity.
Only surviving due to my father's name,
yet I knew it was an unwinnable game.
My hands were pacifying guns,
so I learned to exist without bullets.
I was a black sheep in a strange white herd,
opposing shepherds who couldn't tolerate me.
A clean soul in a dirty social order -
a peaceful heart seeking a place to call home.
Silence is a choice in adulthood.
I used to ignore the pain from unhealed wounds,
but today the inner child screams and shouts,
because oppressors can no longer mute my tongue.
Death taught me not to be bitter,
stubborn fingers how to bleed ink onto paper -
showing compassion in an ugly world.
If life was so simple, we wouldn't look at it differently.
Our perceptions are based on what we have learned,
what was, what is to come and what we search for.
Where you end up depends on how you deal with the past.
A view of the ragged woodland from
The window:-
Slender branched trees that shed
From high above to low below;
The faint, mauven peaks
Smattered with barely visible
Scatterings of drifted snow;
Across the matted undergrowth
A bronzed carpet of copper coloured
Leaves
Whose rusting hue,
Momentarily ignited by stray
Sunbeams weakly smouldering,
Briefly refurbished -
Deceives with all the colours of a
Rainbow...
From vibrant red through to shy
Hints of indigo;
Those vague outlines indicating
Receding hills;
Here, arising, long ago, every waking
Dawning,
The creaking structures
Of groaning and imposing mills;
Soon a slow thawing that quickly
Spills
Into the trickling replenishments
Of many gushing and silvery little
Rills.
Enchantment gripped me!
And I found myself wistfully
Thinking...
Maybe, perhaps, maybe, somewhere,
Just behind where the great
Flattening Orb
Is now rapidly shrinking,
That I might, by perchance, find,
If I did so hope to bravely dare,
To happen upon a hidden and
Sedentary way of life up there?
That, forgotten, has turned its
Back on the social conflicts
Plagued by the curses of ingrained
Vice;
Encumbering a soul with its petty
Squabblings,
Imposing upon with demands and
Avarice...
When placing unnecessary burdens
On a honest bodies daily call
Of grinding toil and wearisome
Strife!
And still stood,
With hands outstretched upon the
Painted sill,
At the waist half-bent,
Now troubled by quiet mutterings
In an inexplicable sorts
Of self-imposed discontent,
My staid consciousness almost
Unawares,
As, momentarily distracted,
I hesitated, and, unseeing,
Inattentively stared...
Until...
A ragged chapter of cawing Daws,
Loudly jabbering overhead,
Suddenly wheeled -
And upwardly soared!
Whereupon, in murderous haste,
Awkwardly fled
When laboriously stealing away
Back inside the stubbled fields...
Thus causing me to slowly straighten;
Whilst, with a singular heartfelt pang,
Liken a moorland mist slowly rolling
Over
That indivisibly conceals...
Drew shut the sullen curtains, which,
Heavily embroidered with indeterminate
finality,
Dejectedly hang...
Each draped aside of the cold
Reveals.
Life is but a fleeting whisper echoing through time,
never dying, always being- magnificent and sublime.
The body's a receptacle, a superficial shell,
but in it dwells the gift of Soul; eternity knows it well.
The Soul contains the truths of life,
to all that's ever been;
to all things now, and yet to come,
but guards them deep within.
The mind has hidden doors to Soul; we long to find the key,
unleash the vision waiting there, that lives eternally.
And so mind seeks to open wide, grasp firm the light of Soul.
and at that moment when it does, we know we will be whole.
So when we penetrate the shield
that stands between these two,
we will perceive with inner sight-
our Soul, complete and new.
If in this life, we cannot grasp this bond of Soul and mind,
we'll be reborn to live again, till total self we find.
We've been before, so many times; we've known many a past.
We'll be again- an echo in time, till mind and Soul are fast.
And when that final day does come,
at last to lift our Soul,
for Him to gather in His arms-
our perfect self- now whole.
May 19, 2016
~1st Place~
Premiere Contest: Imagine A Freedom Beyond Imagination
Sponsor: Mystic Rose Rose
Judged: 02/25/2021
Some religions, like Hinduism, believe in reincarnation which refines the soul by it living many lifetimes, and after it is perfected, goes back to God. My poem is based on that belief. So many people, including myself, have inner feelings or momentary flashbacks like they have lived before in another life.
Within reason
lies a house full of ordinary
a chest of bland memories.
You end up with
a pocketful of might have beens.
Within reason is five square feet of grass
and the proverbial white picket fence,
nothing else.
The word 'important'
never makes it onto the page.
Nothing"within reason" was ever found
that didn't already have its place.
When u abandon
Reason
you also abandon
Impossibilities.
the brother of reason
The one needs the other
two heads of the same dragon.
One breathing fire and brimstone
the other living without hope.
They never live separately
they are siamese twins.
The ying and yang of yesteryears.
They had a reason with a hint of possibility
They had something,
something maybe,
at best something insignificant.
But imagine what waits
when you eliminate 'impossible.'
In the darkest dark
within the scream of 'don’t',
inside the insanity of abandoning reason
it is there you'll find
that decaying flesh infested with worms
it is there where the round wheel was found.
You use a black shovel
through the bone
into the skull
through the brain
along the heart
into the gut.
There lies that fine line between insanity and genius
but THERE is where you have to go.
To get there you abandon reason.
Abandon the dogma shoved down your
throats all these years.
Glide on the wild side.
Show your body hair.
Expose your fangs.
Lights, camera, DANCE!